CORRIDO DE LA SANGRE

A Mexican setting provides the backdrop for this brand new cycle of songs and its stage show, as the Tiger Lillies embark on a Latin vacation that takes a turn for the worst.

★★★★ Storytelling of the highest order… Visually stunning and completely and utterly vaudevillian. A must-see.” 

— – Caught in the Act

An orphan, barely twelve years old, in a dusty, one-horse town... the beautiful Maria, and the drug baron who really shouldn’t have crossed her... strange, furtive rituals and mysterious characters who may be alive, or not, amidst the wild din of the Day of the Dead that swirls all around them... ¿que pasa? What can it all mean...? If only there was a glimpse of poncho and the stench of an evil-smelling cheroot we would know where we were, even a pocket-watch or a distant whistle on the wind... but no, that sound, it’s like Hell’s house-band is playing, and so it is: the Tiger Lillies are going down Mexico way.

A slick and visually impressive stage production.

— British Theatre Guide

Seemingly abducted from their latest touring performances, the band, or perhaps it is the oddly familiar Los Flores del Tigre, wind up in a disreputable outpost near the Mexican border where the singer starts to tell his sorry tale. In these story-telling songs, his corridos, we hear about the tough life he suffered from the start, as a child accordionist playing bars to try and earn enough for a crust of empanada, before a couple of other lost mariachis joined him and together they were given an offer they couldn’t refuse: to sing the praises of the local drug lord. Older now, his heart is inflamed by Maria, who is also being kept at the hacienda, and in his youthful passion he resolves to free her and demonstrate his noble spirit. But Maria is also loved by the wicked crone, who lays a curse on our hero, and thus caught up in such a web of intrigue and emotion there is no escape for him and his compadres. Yet no story like this would be complete without revenge, and eventually we come to understand that the festival of the Day of the Dead is here to be taken very literally indeed.

Something quite stunning… So artistically and skilfully told that you don’t want the end to come.

— The Greater Manchester Reviewer

These songs of murder, retribution and lost love make up the album, which is also the soundtrack for the new, full-length stage show, “Corrido de la Sangre”, presented by HOME and given its world premiere on 20 April, the same day the album is released. The show features projected sets and startling visuals courtesy of regular Tiger Lillies amigo Mark Holthusen (Haunted Palace, Rime of the Ancient Mariner etc.), alongside original music from the Olivier Award-winning and Grammy-nominated trio, widely celebrated and enduringly popular for their distinctive sound that marries high-art cabaret with sordid depravity.

Martyn Jacques’s singing and performance on accordion, piano, harmonica, organ, ukulele or guitar is accompanied as ever by Adrian Stout’s multi-instrument playing, on bass, euphonium and musical saw, plus sepulchral backing vocals; drum duty is handled by Andreas Winter, with guest spots from Jacques and also Timm Brockmann, the master of the mix. For that essential extra quality, Christian Krille plays trumpet on just over half the tracks.

EDGAR ALLAN POE'S HAUNTED PALACE

In a haunted palace a young poet meets the devilish Raven, who supplies him with especially black ink, which guarantees glory and honour. The poet writes frantically and soon runs out. Desperate for more ink, he careers through the many corridors and halls of the palace. In each room he finds a story, a poem, a page of Poe’s imagination, and everywhere there are dying maidens.In a haunted palace a young poet meets the devilish Raven, who supplies him with especially black ink, which guarantees glory and honour.

Loosely based on Poe’s tales and poems, and inspired by his stormy and tragic life, the concert performance retains the author’s own black sense of humour while navigating the inner paths of his soul.

The poet writes frantically and soon runs out. Desperate for more ink, he careers through the many corridors and halls of the palace. In each room he finds a story, a poem, a page of Poe’s imagination, and everywhere there are dying maidens. The Tiger Lillies, infamous for their characteristic sound reminiscent of opera and gypsy music and their raw passion, make music in the intersection between the offensive and the brilliant. It is three years since they last visited Bergen and its festival, and the band promise a visual nightmare and a bizarre musical extravaganza when they – joined by two actors for the occasion – delve into the unfathomable jolie laide world of Edgar Allan Poe. Running time: 90 minutes

Produced with the support of L’Etablissement Public du Parc et de la Grande Halle de La Villette, Paris (France), La Scène Nationale de Sète et du Bassin de Thau (France), L’OARA, l’Office Artistique de la Région Nouvelle-Aquitaine (France). Le Théâtre du Volcan Bleu is funded by the French Ministry of Culture (DRAC Nouvelle-Aquitaine) Album recorded & mixed by Timm Brockmann at Red Light Studio, Berlin, January-March 2017All bass, saw and theremin tracks recorded by Adrian Stout at Blurt Studios, London Drums on the album recording played by Timothy Remfrey Produced by Martyn Jacques CD produced by TheTiger Lillies CD artwork and design by Frédéric DomontAll songs written by Martyn Jacques after original works by PoeCopyright and publishing Misery Guts Music Ltd. 2017

THE TIGER LILLIES PERFORM HAMLET

The Tiger Lillies are back and like post-modern jesters, they tell Shakespeare's tale of the anguished prince Hamlet with their own macabre twist. Directed by Theatre Republique’s Artistic Director Martin Tulinius, The Tiger Lillies Perform Hamlet is an explosion of music and images - a two-hour blast of theatrical seduction, deception, death, dark humour and the utter futility of existence.

A sinful ’HAMLET’ that is innovative, imaginative and incredible. It’s an evening that will haunt you for all the right reasons.



— Copenhagen Post

From Denmark's acclaimed Republique Theatre, featuring stunning circus acts and video projections, as well as giant puppets and a new score from the band, The Tiger Lillies bring their punk cabaret to this tale of betrayal and murder, love and revenge.The Tiger Lillies Perform Hamlet opened in Denmark in 2011 and has been touring extensively in Europe, Asia, Australia and America, gaining great popular and critical acclaim. Running time: 150 minutes (incl interval)

LOVE FOR SALE

Birds do it, bees do it — and here for your entertainment the Tiger Lillies do it, in 16 songs all written by Cole Porter and presented in the band’s particular and distinctive style.

While Cole Porter’s name might not be a part of our everyday conversation it’s surprising just how well known many of his songs are and how they have become part of our culture. In this album we find out what happens when his lyrics are interpreted by the Tiger Lillies. The original songs have probably endured so well because they are such good examples of the songwriter’s art, with economical phrasings and cute rhymes, all ideally suited to performance and open to being covered in a variety of ways. As such, the selection here presents songs performed in a relatively “straight” manner, letting the music or singing give them individual character, while other songs have been more freely adapted by Martyn Jaques, the band’s singer and songwriter, to introduce the seedier elements of low living that are one of the band’s signature notes. Hence the sub-title, A Hymn to Heroin, which points up the ambiguities in certain of these lyrics that are so ripe for exploiting: that burning yearning in “Night and Day” we all recognise, might also be a craving for something other than another person’s love...

The Tiger Lillies and their pithy, witty, humorous songs make for a great night out. This entertaining and talented team which will leave you craving for more.

— Everything Theatre

If that one’s a bit of a tough number, there are plenty of up-beat moments too, with a jaunty version of “You’re the Top”, a delightful seesawing duet on “You Do Something To Me”, with fellow band member Adrian Stout, and a roll-up call to “Let’s Misbehave” to get the album started. The crystalline, haunting rendition of the title-track, “Love For Sale”, will transfix many listeners, while others will really feel how much “Miss Otis Regrets”; on the other hand, depravity and addiction stalk “Begin the Beguine” and, not surprisingly, “I Get a Kick Out of You”, in a couple of other heroin tracks, as we might call them. The album is being released on 10 July, just before a two-week run of its stage-show performance, “Love For Sale”, at London’s Soho Theatre. The “Olivier Award-winning godfathers of alternative cabaret”, as the theatre website introduces the Tiger Lillies, will be working with Opera North Projects, with whom they have collaborated on a number of shows previously and to great acclaim. This will also be a return to a venue where the band has played many times over the years, this time with a somewhat twisted cabaret showcase of these reimagined Cole Porter songs that lays bare some of the delirium and despair that lies beneath the surface of his romantic show-tunes. Running time: 90 minutes

cold night in soho

The album has been released on 26 January 2017, significantly, this is also the band’s first album not connected to a theatre show in about ten years. As cruel winter once again closes in there comes a time to look back on the year, but in the case of the Tiger Lillies it is a longer look, back to the band’s first steps in the racy and often heartless world of Soho in the 1980s. The muse of song-writing beckoned to Martyn Jacques, the band’s leader and lyricist, and turned his head towards memories of the time he himself was living in Soho, amidst the prostitutes and drug fiends, the sleazemongers and local eccentrics who would all go on to populate his songs over the years. Before the widespread sanitisation of central London in recent times, the closing of the sex shops and the XXX-rated cinemas, there was risk, excitement and colour here, in all its gaudy and unexpected variety. All gone now, the frisson clinically ironed out, blandness installed.

***** Tears your heart out

— The Independent, Album Of The Week

So here we find a series of snapshots of a vanished Soho, such as the women trapped in the endless cycle of turning tricks in clip joints, with the threat of violence every day, in “Soho Clipper Blues”, or the career alcoholic of Soho’s legendary drinking dens whose stupor merges with the booziness of weekend drinkers in “Let’s Drink”. Starched soldiers of the Salvation Army made forays into these degenerate streets, on missions to reclaim souls for God, but the futility of their efforts is laid bare in the song of the same name. There is a continuing theme of religion and redemption in the following songs, “You Wouldn’t Know” and “The First Day”, but this is a world in which the odds are stacked against a win for good, and the cold passing of time (“Ticking of the Hours”) counts off our decades as mere numbers (“Go”). There is a risk, “In the Winter”, that we may all wind up frozen to death in a gutter (“Just Another Day”). But it’s not all a walk down such hopeless one-way streets, and aside from these general portraits and scenic views there are some more personal songs in this collection. Some of the very first gigs the Tiger Lillies performed are memorialised in “Dance Floor”, which shows us the King’s Head in Islington’s Upper Street as it was until only a couple of years ago, a theatre pub with a corner for live music acts which could quite easily slip into the wildest turmoil. A little further north, in “Finsbury Park”, we discover how insalubrious that part of town used to be, and how a busker like Martyn would need to watch where he put his feet. Most interesting of all is the long and heartbreaking lament of the title track, which closes the album, looking back across three decades to a life lost in Soho, and a streetwalker with an unforgettable name... Running time: 90 minutes

All other tracks recorded by ADRIAN STOUT at BLUNT STUDIOS, London TIMM BROCKMANN/ Mixing and Mastering MARTYN JACQUES/ Producer CD Produced by The Tiger Lillies CD Artwork and desing by Fréderic Domont Photos by Martyna Lach Recorded in September and October 2016

THE BALLAD OF sexual dependency.

the tiger lillies & nan goldin

The Tiger Lillies perform a live soundtrack for the Ballad, one continuous piece of music that evolves and underscores the beauty, pain, joy, tragedy and sorrow of relationships and the startling images by Nan Goldin.

The forty five slide show, including over 700 images and a sound track, functions like a film. The Ballad of Sexual Dependency, constantly reedited and updated, began its public life on the club circuit in New York City and has since been shown at museums, galleries, film festivals, and alternative spaces both in the U.S. and abroad.

‘This set of photographs works like a film with characters. A story without words, fifty minutes, magnified by the music of The Tiger Lillies, a dark atmosphere of crazed cabaret. Martyn Jacques, made-up face, singing with his husky tenor refrain Sexual Dependency. A fragile moment of grace ...’ 

— Le Monde

"I met Nan a few years ago now. She used to come to our gigs in Brooklyn. She then got in touch and showed me her photo collection, the Ballad of Sexual Dependency. For me it was an inspiration. Her work felt so close, the lives of people from urban subcultures, the underground. Non-conformists. People making their own rules, living lives their own way. It reminded me of my own youth, drugs, night clubs, sex, fetishism. Sad photos as well of abuse and self-harm. So I wrote an epic poem on a subject so close to my own experience and youth. It’s a piece of music and set of lyrics I love. It’s an honour to work with and be inspired by such a great artist as Nan." - Martyn Jaques

"For almost three decades I’ve travelled throughout the world projecting many different versions of ‘The Ballad of Sexual Dependancy’, from downtown clubs to cinemas and finally to museums. What started as a home movie has expanded through dozens of audiences’ reactions. I’ve collected all kinds of music - much of it as gifts - in the same way I’ve collected images. I’ve edited dozens of versions of the soundtrack, which has functioned as my narrative voice, the lyrics often explaining my attitude toward images, from irony to tenderness. This will be the second time, after the Tate Modern Live Performance in 2008, that I’m collaborating with musicians who have created their own original score in relation to the slideshows." - Nan Goldin Running time : 45 minutes (+45 mins of concert)

THE VERY WORST OF THE TIGER LILLIES

The Tiger Lillies present their fiercest, filthiest tunes for the perverse pleasure of fans old and new. Mean, moody and magnificent – if hell had a house band, it’d be The Tiger Lillies. The cult musical three-piece from London have been unleashing their riotous cabaret, music hall antics and bar room brawl songs on audiences the world over. Formed in 1989, the Olivier award winners’ distinctive musical style weaves together the macabre magic of pre-war Berlin, anarchic opera and gypsy music, echoing the voices of Bertolt Brecht, Jacques Brel, Piaf and the savage edge of punk.

The Tiger Lillies have got to be one of the most bizarre, irreverent, morbid case of right place right time I’ve ever seen, and there’s no better tonic to cure the politically-correct attitudes of our time than their brand of Cryptkeeper Cabaret! 

— Brodie Paparella, BBW

Led by the accordion-wielding ‘Criminal Castrato’ Martyn Jacques, the Grammy-nominated group present a show of wild emotion, featuring the greatest and worst songs of their 27-year career. Prepare to be enthralled by the darkly funny music and bizarre beauty of The Tiger Lillies. The Tiger Lillies attracted mainstream recognition for composing the music and starring in the junk opera Shockheaded Peter. Having recently won rave reviews for their new shows The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Lulu – A Murder Ballad, these performances are not to be missed. Running time: 90 minutes

CREDITS:

MADAME PIAF

For the centenary year of the birth of Edith Piaf (1915–1963), the French cabaret singer, it was only right that the Tiger Lillies paid her a visit. And so Martyn Jaques opened up the songbook of France’s “little sparrow” to see what he might find with a view to marking Piaf’s somewhat less-than-happy life and career in a new album and stage show. It was rich material and the resulting production Madame Piaf has now appeared to much acclaim at a number of venues around Europe.

Madame Piaf is a sincere and pitiless tribute to the celebrated chanteuse, for whom Martyn Jacques says: “I’ve met girls like Edith Piaf. They’re usually described as having borderline personality disorder. They’re alcoholics, drug addicts and often prostitutes. Funny that she is today a symbol of French national pride, an icon. It’s interesting that when asked about her mother, also a singer (and “part-time” prostitute), Piaf said she could have made it but was simply unlucky. So I suppose that makes Piaf a lucky alcoholic drug and man addict. But who cares — France didn’t, nor do I. She was great, electric. She came from the gutter but is one of the best singers ever.”

The album and show include a mixture of original new songs written by Martyn, together with half a dozen cover versions of Piaf’s own songs, sung in English and including her most well-known tracks, “La Vie en Rose”, Padam, and of course, “No Regrets (Non, Je ne Regrette Rien)”. The Tiger Lillies tell the story of Edith Piaf’s everyday life in the bohemian byways of the French capital after the Second World War.

Production : The Tiger Lillies Associate Production : QuaternaireCoproduction : Maison de la musique de Nanterre (FR), Scène Nationale de Sète et du Bassin de Thau (FR), Théâtre du Volcan Bleu (FR) Videos are sourced from the archives of the French National Institute of Audiovisual (INA). Thanks to Naïa Productions and OperAct.

LULU - A MURDER BALLAD

The character of Lulu is one of the great creations of 20th Century fiction, and one of its most disturbing. Her unbridled sex appeal, her youth, and her self-destructiveness combine to make her dangerous, unpredictable and tragic. With the men (and the women) who circle her, Lulu’s journey from street prostitute to the toast of Society and back again, is told as a hypnotic and kaleidoscopic dance of death. Journey with her from Berlin to Paris and finally to the dark London streets of Jack The Ripper.

Only 80 minutes long, divided into two acts, the treatment is brilliantly theatrical and hugely entertaining. At first, one worries that Jacques’ comically sinister persona and gloating leers will pall, but the changes in tone and pace are so astutely judged that one is sucked inexorably into his blackly comic and perfectly horrible vision of the world.

— Rupert Christiansen, The Telegraph

The Tiger Lillies’ genre-defying brand of other-worldly vocals and unnerving performance style have carved them a unique niche in the cabaret and music theatre scene. After a sell-out run of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner at the Southbank Centre, the cult creators of the award-winning Shockheaded Peternow stage another adaptation of a macabre classic.

The band’s flamboyant live performance is enhanced by large-scale virtual sets that create an immersive and richly atmospheric environment. Across 20 songs and interludes, the ballad of Lulu unfolds as an uncompromising musical and visual melodrama. Running time: 80 minutes

Dancer : Laura CaldowBased on Earth Spirit (1895) and Pandora’s Box (1904) by Frank Wedekind. Commissioned by Opera North Projects. Support from PRS for Music Foundation Performed by The Tiger Lillies and Laura Caldow. ) Age advisory 16+

rime of the ancient mariner

With Rime of the Ancient Mariner - a 90-minute musical adaptation of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s greatest work - the band collaborates with American visual artist Mark Holthusen to create a show that is somewhere between a baroque movie and a concert.

The show is a glorious visual cabinet of curiosities that enthrals on all its surreal fronts, a version of madness that matches the lonely voice of Coleridge’s mariner with the sadness of Jacques’ lyrics and music... Unforgettable.

— The Arts Desk

For killing an albatross, the mariner and his crew are punished with drought and death. Amidst a series of supernatural events, the mariner’s life alone is spared and he repents. His penance is to wander the earth and tell his tale with the lesson that “all things great and small” are important.

In a modern retelling of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s classic, legendary balladeers The Tiger Lillies spin this epic tale into a hauntingly beautiful, large-scale multimedia performance. Together with acclaimed visual artist Mark Holthusen, the flamboyant and eccentric band unfolds the story of the ill-fated mariner with exquisite melancholy and lusty menace. Part concert and part film, this is a welcome return from the co-creators of the cult sensation Shockheaded Peter. The show premiered in France in 2012 and has since toured extensively receiving an enthusiastic audience response as well as rave reviews throughout the world. Running time: 90 minutes

VARIETÉ

(Variety) (1925) (a.k.a. Jealousy) "Boss" and his wife Berta-Marie are partners in a new trapeze number. One day, the famous trapeze artist Artinelli takes note of them and engages them for his trapeze show in Berlin. Their salto mortale becomes an immediate sensation. Calculatedly and cold, Artinelli seduces Berta-Marie and destroys "Boss'" happiness."Variete" was a sensation when it appeared, primarily for its beautifully detailed performances and terrific camerawork by Karl Freund. The trapeze sequences will leave you giddy. The montages of variety acts are witty and vibrant. Berlin nightlife in the '20s looks glamorous. Restored print of Variete with a new soundtrack from The Tiger Lillies.